Thomas Cook employee jailed for £60k credit card frauds
A Thomas Cook business assistant was jailed for nearly five years for duping the travel firm and a previous employer out of more than £60,000.
Angelika Schell, 54, treated herself to lunches, flights abroad, and taxis rides to work with her Thomas Cook company credit card.
She stole £37,000 over two years, and tried to bully a colleague into dropping the charges against her when she was finally caught out, the London Evening Standard reported.
The Old Bailey heard that German-born Schell was spared prison in October 2014 for stealing £26,000 from previous employers, green energy firm the Brook Henderson Group, where she was PA to the chief executive.
But she hid this conviction from Thomas Cook and seamlessly moved on to her next scam, even abusing the company credit card to pay off £1,300 of court fines.
She was given the card while working at Thomas Cook’s City of London headquarters, spending £30,957 on shopping sprees and trips to the hairdresser, £3,363 on taxis, more than £2,000 on a colleague’s credit card, and £833 on flights to Germany.